Olympic Games 2016 – Rio De Janeiro BRAZIL

Swimming Legend, Michael Phelps who has won more medals in the Olympic Pool than any other Athlete in the history of the Games signed off in Brazil in style. Ryan Murphy (1st), Cody Miller (02nd) & Adrian Nathan (04th) ensured that Michael Phelps (03rd) stayed in front in each lap to win Gold for USA in the Men’s 100M Medley Relay. They established a new Olympic Record with a time of 03 min 27.95 sec in the last event of the competition to end the 07 days of competition. Team USA won 16 Gold Medals in the Pool, establishing several World & many Olympic Records in the process. Michael Phelps has bagged 23 Gold, 03 Silver & 02 Bronze Medals. The aggregate of 28 Medals came in 04 Olympic Games – Athens, Greece (2004) 06 Golds, 02 Bronze, Beijing, China (2008) 08 Golds, London, England (2012) 04 Gold, 02 Silver & Rio, Brazil 05 Golds, 01 Silver. He was beaten by Joseph Schooling (Singapore) in the Men’s 100M Butterfly Stroke, the first for him & his country in Rio.

MangalaSamarakoon was involved in his second event – the 50 M Rifle Prone Men’s Qualification Round. He fired from the 39th Position and managed an aggregate of 601.80 points for his 06 Rounds and was placed 47th& last. The best for him was the 5th Round of 101.90 Points. The best qualifier was Sergey Kamenskiy (Russia) with 629 Points – an Olympic Record. The 8th& last qualifier, Henri Junghaenel (Germany) went onto win the Gold Medal collecting 209.50 Points – a Finals Olympic Record. He is also the World Record Holder.

The Olympic Movement experienced a historic moment when the first ever Refugee Athletic Team participation was recorded at the XXXIst Summer Olympic Games Rio 2016. The 10 member team comprising 04 Females & 06 Males are participating under the International Olympic Committee Flag.

On the 06th day of competition at the Rio 2016 Olympic Games in Brazil, Niluka Karunaratne became the 06th Sri Lankan Athlete to compete. He was involved in the Group Stage of Badminton Men’s Singles from Group P. Privileged to play his first match on Center Court One against Two Time World Champion & Second Seed Long Chen of China, Sri Lanka’s leading Singles player, Niluka Karunaratnewas beaten 21 – 07, 21 – 10. He led in the 2nd set upto the first 05 points after scoring the first point. His second match is against 51st World Ranked Kevin Cordan of Guatemala, who is the reigning Pan American Games Champion in his 03rd Olympics. Niluka Karunaratne’s current World Ranking is 93.

The 04th day of competition in the XXXIst Summer Olympic Games Rio 2016 featured Swimmer, Matthew Abeysinghe the 04th Sri Lankan Athlete to be in competition in Brazil. Participating in the Men’s 100M Freestyle, he was included in Lane 4 in the 02nd Heat & finished 03rd . His performance of 50.96 sec was well below his best. Mathew Abeysinghe was placed 50th out of 59 Swimmers in 08 Heats.

The International Olympic Committee delegation headed by Jerome Poivey, Head of Institutional Relations met the Sri Lanka delegation headed by the President of the National Olympic Committee of Sri Lanka, Hemasiri Fernando. High officials of the Olympic Council of Asia, Sports Minister, Dayasiri Jayasekera, Secretary General of the NOC Sri Lanka & Chef de Mission of the Sri Lanka contingent to the XXXIst Summer Olympic Games 2016 in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil – Maxwell De Silva also attended the meeting held in the host city.

Jinaraja MV, Gampola has reason to be proud. They have produced some outstanding sports personalities over the years. Today at the XXXIst Summer Olympic Games now being held in Rio de Janeiro, past pupil & Judoka, Nuwan Chamara Dharmawardene participated in the 11th contest on Mat 01 from the Blue Corner in the Men’s 73 Kgs weight class. In his first ever major International competition, the 24 year old beat his opponent, Benjamin Waterhouse of American Samoa – the result being 101s1 – 0s4. That was the Elimination Round of 32. Coach, Amal Rathnayake together with the National Olympic Committee of Sri Lanka will be pleased that the wild card entry afforded to him was worthwhile with the Sports Minister, Dayasiri Jayasekera also present at the arena. In the next Round of 16, he was beaten by Lasha Shavdatuashvili of Georgia in a time of 2 min 44 secs.in Contest No.20 with the result being 100 – 0s2 & Penalties 0 – 52 in favour of the winner.

The Sports Minister, Dayasiri Jayasekera together with Director General of Sports,Saman Bandara met the Sri Lankan Contingent at the Athletes Village of the Rio 2016 Olympic Games in Brazil. On the second day of competition, Kimiko Raheem performed way below par as she participated in the second heat of the Women’s 100M Backstroke. In Lane Two she was timed at 01 min 05.63 sec for her 4th place finish.

The first Gold Medal of The Rio 2016 Olympic Games was claimed by 19 year old American University Student, Shooter Virginia Thrasher in the Women’s 10M Air Rifle event when she aggregated 208 points to establish an Olympic Record. The first medal for hosts, Brazil was claimed by Shooter Felipe Almeida Wu in the Men’s 10M Air Pistol event where he won Silver. The Gold Medalist in the same event, XuanVinh Hoang of Vietnam created history to be the first to win an Olympic Gold Medal in any sport for his country.

At commentary for Royal vs Wesley Match. @ThePapareSports @ricky_simms Good come back by wesley. #SriLankaSat Feb 13 06:05:43 +0000 2016

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